Books to read before Wordstock Sudbury Literary Festival

The Wordstock Sudbury Literary Festival is just around the corner. If you are looking for your next read, consider picking up a title written by one of the authors who will be in Sudbury during the first week of November and then stop in to meet the author at the festival.

Literary festivals are a great time for readers to meet authors, for writers to hone their skills and for our community to celebrate the literary arts. There are many great writers coming to this year’s Wordstock Festival; here are just a few titles available to pick up at the Greater Sudbury Public Library before the first weekend in November.

In Birds Art Life, writer Kyo Maclear embarks on a yearlong, big city adventure chasing after birds, and along the way offers a luminous meditation on the nature of creativity and the quest for a good and meaningful life. For Vladimir Nabokov, it was butterflies. For John Cage, it was mushrooms. For Sylvia Plath, it was bees. Each of these artists took time away from their work to become observers of natural phenomena.

In 2012, Maclear met a local Toronto musician with an equally captivating side passion — he had recently lost his heart to birds. Curious about what prompted this young urban artist to suddenly embrace nature, Kyo decides to follow him for a year and find out.

Maclear also has a number of beautiful children’s books like Virginia Wolf, Yak and Dove and The Fog. Maclear will be joining local author Rosanna Battigelli for a kids program at the festival. Battigelli has recently released her new children’s book Pumpkin, Orange, Pumpkin Round.

Rooted in sacred stories, in the Qur’anic concept of the Day of Alast (the Day of the Primordial Covenant), and in remembrance of the Divine, Yusuf and the Lotus Flower embraces Abrahamic and Indic orientations without exoticizing either.

Yusuf (Joseph) is a figure common to Judeo-Christian and Islamic narratives. The lotus is common to Hindu, Jain, Buddhist, Sikh, and yogic philosophy. In distinct ways, both motifs symbolize beautiful tenacity throughout hardship.

In 18 Miles; The epic drama of our atmosphere and its weather by Christopher Dewdney is a kaleidoscopic and fact-filled journey that uncovers our obsession with the atmosphere and weather ― as both evocative metaphor and physical reality. From the roaring winds of Katrina to the frozen oceans of Snowball Earth, Dewdney entertains as he gives readers a long-overdue look at the very air we breathe.

Notes Towards Recovery by Louise Ells is a short story collection that explores loss and the spaces around loss. At the centre of these stories are everyday women who must navigate these spaces and their shifting boundaries, often redefining themselves in the process.

This is just a glimpse of the wide range of writers and topics that will be highlighted at this year’s Wordstock Festival. For more information, visit WordstockSudbury.ca.

Jessica Watts is the lead supervisor for the Lively, Garson, Copper Cliff and Coniston libraries at the Greater Sudbury Public Library.